WASHINGTON -- Keeping with his post-election pledge to reform the filibuster, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Tuesday proffered that changes to the rules of the upper chamber will be made, leaving it up to Republicans if they would like to participate.

"There are discussions going on now [over filibuster reform], but I want to tell everybody here. I'm happy I've had a number of Republicans come to me, a few Democrats, Reid told reporters Tuesday at his weekly press availability. We're going to change the rules. We cannot continue in this way. I hope we can get something that the Republicans will work with us on.

But it won't be a handshake, he added. We tried that last time. It didn't work.

Harry Reid was against the filibuster rule change before coming out for it. In 2005, when Republicans threatened to change the rules to weaken Senate Democrats, Reid was a vocal opponent.

For people to suggest that you can break the rules to change the rules is un-American, said Reid in 2005, in response to Republicans wanting to change the rules. The only way you can change the rule in this body is through a rule that now says, to change a rule in the Senate rules to break a filibuster still requires 67 votes. You cant do it with 60. You certainly cannot do it with 51. But now we are told the majority is going to do the so-called nuclear option. We will come in here, having the Vice President seated where my friend and colleague from Nevada is seated. The Parliamentarian would acknowledge it is illegal, it is wrong, you cant do it, and they would overrule it. It would simply be: We are going to do it because we have more votes than you. You would be breaking the rules to change the rules. That is very un-American.

NO. Reid says he'll do it with a simple majority. It's done. Boehner has said once Reid does this, all Senate bills that arrive at the House are DOA. But knowing the gutless Boehner, he'll cave on that, too. In the next four years we get to experience the fall of Rome here at home.

The only way you can change the rule in this body is through a rule that now says, to change a rule in the Senate rules to break a filibuster still requires 67 votes. You cant do it with 60. You certainly cannot do it with 51.

Au contraire. Every session of Congress establishes the rules under which it will operate. The Constitution says absolutely nothing about this requiring anything other than a simple majority.

Is what they are planning outrageous, given their objections when they were in the minority?

In the absence of the filibuster, are there any tools the Repubs can use to block consent of presidential appointments? And if so, how soon do the families of Repubs have their lives threatened by Obama’s gangsters?

There will be no purpose for the Senate to exist as a body. Originally it represented the state interests in opposition to the wants of the People. Folks could affect the composition of the Senate by selecting alternate local legislators, where they had more power. The House decides for the People by simple majority. If the Senate amends its structure to mimic the HoR, there is no distinction between the two bodies. The constitutional powers delegated to the states should be given to the HoR and the Senate disbanded.

Definitely have to give the “D’s” credit.
They not only know how to play the game, they play it with vengeance and take no prisoners.

As noted in the article Reid had already been against this.

NOW watch.

If, by some divine intervention and a miracle to top changing water into wine, the R’s WIN in 2014 and take over the Senate, one of the LAST things D’s will do is REVERSE this particular rule - AFTER passing every piece of trash bill that is pending.

THAT, sorrowfully, is the way the R’s are going to have to start playing the game.

This passiveness just makes them look weak and US foolish for allowing them to ‘represent’ us....

33
posted on 12/05/2012 11:24:08 AM PST
by xrmusn
(6/98 "It is virtually impossible to clean the pond as long as the pigs are still crapping in it")

Folks, if we ever get a Republican President, Senate and House, they will have to make massive changes to do any good. Just tinkering around the edges of our fiscal, Obamacare and regulatory Charlie Foxtrot may help a bit, in a marginal way, but it won't change the fact that we are on a collision course with catastrophe.

It takes 60 votes to overcome a filibuster in the Senate. The Republican high mark in the last century was 59 in 1920 That was over 60% of the then 96 seats in the Senate. Thanks to losing seats three cycles in a row, the Republicans only hold 8 seats in the Senate "class" that was just elected, and the Democrats hold 25. Which means the Democrats hold just 30 seats of the 67 seats up the the next two general elections. Do you think that the Republicans are going to defend 37 seats in those two elections, and pick up a net of 15, giving them 60 seats? Me either.

So to have any shot at all of passing big legislation, if the Republicans somehow win the Presidency, Senate and House in 2016, the filibuster rule has to be changed. Do you think that "Majority Leader" Mitch McConnell is going to change the filibuster rule, with the Democrats and press yelling and screaming? Me either.

So we need Harry Reid to do it for us. The downside will be bad, but the upside could save the Country.

This commie pig will change the “filibuster reform” back when it suits him and his commie ‘RAT pals. Reid is a disgrace. He is not an American. He’s a commie pig. Americans have lost control of their government.

In the next four years we get to experience the fall of Rome here at home.

That took a few hundred years. Our fall will be quicker and it's underway. However there will be some ups and downs, but the ups will be false starts (just an opportunity for the Repubs to slow down the fall a little bit, but not change direction). I'd give us another 50 years, but with greatly reduced influence in the world.

So we need Harry Reid to do it for us. The downside will be bad, but the upside could save the Country.

Perhaps so. But waiting for another election may not work as well now as in the past. It appears some on FR may be confusing passivity for patience. Reid is sure doing it TO us while some FReepers hope he may do something inadvertently FOR us.

So to have any shot at all of passing big legislation, if the Republicans somehow win the Presidency, Senate and House in 2016, the filibuster rule has to be changed.

Even if we had the seats and the filibuster override it will never happen. The changes go against too many special interests that senators (especially) are beholden to and they will never vote to cut their power. The only thing that will fix this mess is default and reset.

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